by Matt Fildes
Hey everybody!
One of the things GF and I like to do, that literally costs nothing, is we go to our city library and check out books. On our latest trip, I happened to pick up a book called “Stuffocation” by James Wallman. While not necessarily the best book out there, it does discuss whether or not we are living with too much “stuff” and how we can overcome it. While reading the book, I often looked back to an apartment I had a few years ago that I loved, which happened to be just over 400 SF. It was essentially one large room and a bathroom, with a short half-wall (the ceilings were 20 ft high) separating the bedroom from the remaining living space. The apartment was so small that I could only keep what I used on a fairly regular basis, and, in fact, I lived for about a year without having any furniture at all- just a mattress on the floor for my bed and 2 folding lawn chairs in the living room. There was something about having the minimal space that just appealed to me, and is still appealing to me.
We currently live in a what many would consider a “small” house- only 1,300SF, but me and GF both agree that it feels wayyy too big at times. It feels like more often than not, we can’t find things we use on a regular basis. On top of that, we’re constantly tripping over objects we never use, that are just filling in the empty floor space. In an effort to purge ourselves of these unwanted and unnecessary items (and make some money!) we decided to have a garage sale this weekend.
My mindset for determining if a possession of mine should be sold is 1) I haven’t used it in a while, meaning in the last year or longer 2) or I’ve gotten something, either newer or an upgrade, that can replace what I was using (my old guitar and amp fall into this category). My thoughts for if a possession could be sold is 1) it’s in good condition and 2) it’s in good working order, or easily repairable with a little time and know-how.
However, this being said, I do have quite a bit of items that on the surface seem like I should sell them, but deep in my soul, they still hold that sentimental value, like gifts from family or items I bought myself for reaching various goals of mine. I’ve been googling on how to best part with these special items and I’m thinking that I should just do it, since what are the chances I’ll miss them, especially if they haven’t moved from the spot I put them 3 years ago. I just don’t want to have any regrets later on thinking “Man, I shouldn’t have sold that.” One piece of advice I saw said to take a picture of the item as memento vs having the physical item taking up space and collecting dust. This definately feels plausible. Do any of you out there have any advice dealing with this?
And to the title of my post- this is my first garage sale. Ever. I’m not sure how to value anything to make it sell without feeling like I got robbed. I don’t want to price things so high that people are insulted, either. As a garage sale newbie, it’s seems fairly simple but I’m feeling pretty intimidated right now. Please help! Any tips and advice in the comments is greatly appreciated!
Have a great week!
